The Phantom of the Opera - His Majesty's Theatre

May I change the direction of this thread and return to the show itself: The Phantom of the Opera.

I am enjoying a West End Producer's new book but I was disappointed to find him telling an incorrect version of how Andrew Lloyd Webber hit upon writing Phantom and I thought I would set out the true story here so that readers of this estimable website will know what really happened. I give below an edited version of what currently appears in Wikipedia.  I know this is correct because I was the person who advised Ken Hill on the selection of the operatic material that he used in his revised 1984 version of the show.

KEN HILL’S PHANTOM OF THE OPERA

Ken Hill’s Phantom of the Opera was the first musical version of the story by Gaston Leroux and it inspired the award-winning Andrew Lloyd Webber musical.

While rummaging through a used-book shop, theatre director and writer Ken Hill picked up a copy of Gaston Leroux's novel The Phantom of the Opera and eventually produced it as a stage musical. The first performance, at The Duke’s Playhouse in Lancaster, was on 26 July 1976, where it proved to be a hit. It was directed by John Blackmore, designed by Clare Lyth, with musical direction by Gary Yershon. It differed from the later version of Hill’s musical in having a modern musical score by Ian Armit (who also worked with Hill on other productions) in addition to excerpts from the opera Faust by Charles Gounod.


In 1984, Hill revived his musical version of The Phantom of the Opera. This time however, he wanted to add the kind of music that would have been heard at the Paris Opéra (Palais Garnier) in the late 19th century. Consequently, he discarded the modern score by Ian Armit and fitted his original English lyrics to opera arias by Gounod, Offenbach, Verdi, Weber, Mozart, Donizetti, and Boito, thus creating a musical that reflected the era in which the original novel was set. This revised version of The Phantom of the Opera was put on as a joint production by the Newcastle Playhouse and the Theatre Royal Stratford East, and premiered at the Newcastle Playhouse on 3 April 1984, before shortly moving to Stratford East. The Theatre Royal Stratford East was opened in December 1884 and Phantom was presented as part of its centenary year celebrations. When the show got to Stratford East, Sarah Brightman, who later created the role of Christine in the Lloyd Webber version, was asked to perform the role of Christine in the 1984 cast but she turned it down, leaving the part for the opera singer Christina Collier.

Andrew Lloyd Webber, who at the time was married to Brightman, and Cameron Mackintosh attended a performance of Ken Hill’s Phantom of the Opera at the Theatre Royal Stratford East. Prompted by the good reviews, they approached Hill about the possibility of their collaborating on developing a grand scale version of his Phantom in the West End, and offered to produce it. In fact, Hill and Lloyd Webber had worked together earlier on a revival of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat at the Winchester Theatre. Lloyd Webber and his producer, Cameron Mackintosh, had been highly enthusiastic when they broached Hill about his Phantom of the Opera but in the end, Lloyd Webber chose to pursue the musical without Hill.


Productions of Hill's Phantom of the Opera in the USA in St. Louis and San Francisco were so successful that Hill was asked to mount a national tour of the United States. Jonathan Reinis (who later produced Ken Hill’s The Invisible Man in London) formed Phantom Touring Company Inc. who acted as the producers for the tour, along with Electric Factory Concerts. The tour began in 1989, with musical arrangements and designs by the original Newcastle Playhouse team. It performed to packed houses all over America for several years and travelled to approximately 110 cities.

In 1991, Phantom of the Opera returned to the United Kingdom where it embarked on a national tour produced by Stewart Macpherson and then transferred to London’s West End. It opened at the Shaftesbury Theatre on 18 December 1991, with a similar cast to the 1984 production - Peter Straker was The Phantom and Christina Collier was Christine. But despite positive reviews, the West End production did poorly at the box office at the time of IRA bombings, and closed earlier than expected, on 11 April 1992.  A West End Cast recording was released.

I saw Ken Hill's Phantom on tour in 2001. Loved it. It wasn't until eight years later I first saw ALW's version. I remember that the tour's publicity had to make it clear that it wasn't the show that was at Her Majesty's.

OK. I'll précis it for the bones rather than the funny bits: 

"In 1984 after parting with Tim Rice, Andrew Lloyd Webber contacted Cameron Mackintosh to discuss a new musical based on The Phantom of the Opera and they both watched the two movie versions of Phantom (1925 Lon Chaney and 1943 Claud Raines) but realised it would be difficult to turn the story into a musical so put the idea on hold.  Not long after, ALW was in New York and found a copy of the Gaston Leroux novel which inspired him to begin developing the show.  In 1985 ALW held a private preview of the first act in his house and the finished show opened in the West End in 1986."

The WEP's version is taken from the Wikipedia entry for The Phantom of the Opera by Andrew Lloyd Webber with some funny bits added.

Thanks for this, tonyloco, seems like our WEP skimped on the detail here in order to make the story easier to tell!

I should point out that, personally, I have little to no interest in Ken Hill’s adaptation, but interested to read about how each one came about and how they have (sort of) existed alongside each other for so many years!

Actually, I am really not blaming WEP for this but rather the Wikipedia entry on ALW's Phantom of the Opera which presumably comes from the story put out by the Really Useful Company. It would not have hurt them to have mentioned Ken Hill's musical Phantom of the Opera which ALW and Cameron Mackintosh saw at Stratford East in 1984 as part of the inspiration for ALW's version.  This is not just hearsay or supposition because it is a well documented fact (including in Wikipedia in the separate entry on the Ken Hill version) that CM in effect took a first option on the Stratford show personally with Ken Hill with the intention that he would produce a reworked version with ALW in the West End.  I know because I was there, playing piano in the bar. There was huge excitement around the theatre that CM and ALW were going to develop the show as a vehicle for Sarah Brightman in the West End but sadly, after the initial enthusiastic discussion, nothing further was heard from CM until it became clear that CM and ALW were indeed pursuing the subject but starting from scratch and Ken Hill then was free to exploit his version in any way he wanted, so long as it was made clear that it had no connection with the ALW show. 

Eureka, BurleyBeaR! If you watch the video from 5:30 you will see Ken Hill's 'Phantom' at Stratford East and ALW and CM discussing whether they could turn it into a West End show but, for whatever reason, they did not at that time do anything further about it beyond having a preliminary discussion with Ken Hill. I can well believe that ALW finding a copy of the original novel in New York not that long afterwards gave ALW the raw material for him to start developing his own version for which he did not need Ken Hill, even though he had seen that KH's version proved the story was stage-worthy. As we have seen from the operatic world, there are a number of stories that have been set by different composers such as 'Manon Lescaut', 'La Boheme', 'The Barber of Seville' and various others, so why not two versions of 'Phantom of the Opera' as a musical? My gripe in all this is that ALW and CM seeing the KH version at Stratford East has somehow been forgotten in the version of the origins of the ALW 'Phantom' now put out by the RUC as in Wikipedia.

Well, I think I have certainly hammered my point home in this thread and hopefully anybody reading it will now know that ALW did not just suddenly have a brainwave all by himself that POTO would be a great subject for a musical but was influenced to some extent by seeing Ken Hill's version.

I’m not sure about the official line put out by the RUG, but Andrew Lloyd Webber has always seemed to make the Ken Hill connection clear in interviews, as it is in all ALW biographies that I can think of.

It will be interesting to see how Lloyd Webber recounts it in his memoir, though we’ll have to wait for Vol. II for The Phantom of the Opera.

In the 25 RAH does Sierra hit that note at the the end of the titular song? Or is it faked?

I have just realised that BurleyBeaR and Oleanna are discussing a high E that should be sung by Carlotta in Phantom. I have a little anecdote about that which I heard from an acquaintance who got it from an acquaintance..... It seems that at some point some years after Phantom first appeared that Rosemary Ashe, who had created Carlotta, was returning to the role once again. I don't know exactly where or when but apparently in rehearsal, Rosemary opted not to sing the high E, to which the MD insisted:

"Oh, you must sing the high E because it's what Andrew Lloyd Webber wrote." 

"No" replied Rosie, "it's what I wrote! It was my suggestion that Carlotta would sing that note because back in 1986 I had it in my voice, which I no longer do, so let's get on with me singing the lower option now."

That may be apocryphal but it's a nice story nevertheless. 

Thanks BurlyBeaR – I'm glad I am not boring people too much with my stream of consciousness ramblings. And from now on I will spell your moniker correctly!

Interesting story. Not sure when this story relates to or how many times Rosemary Ashe returned to the role of Carlotta, but she played Carlotta on the first occasion I saw Phantom in London (it was either 1990 or 1991 - can’t quite remember). I was so excited to see her as she was fantastic on the cast recording. As far as I remember, she sang every note as written, though she wasn’t anywhere near as ‘polished’ as her voice appeared on the recording. I think she actually sang all of the notes that appeared on the recording though.

I've just started watching the Broadway.com Vlog of the production over there (the new series of it has just started), and holy crap Peter Joback is hot! Possibly the hottest Phantom I've seen!